Incarnate (Newsoul, #1)

Incarnate
Jodi Meadows
374 pages
Released: January 31, 2012
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Source: library
★★★☆☆

You can read the Goodreads summary here.

I remember in the two months before this book came it it was all abuzz around the Internet.  It seemed like so many people had ARCs and it seemed like it was going to be such a fantastic novel, I was dismayed that I couldn't get my hands on an early copy.  Then I forgot about it until it came up on my library's RSS feed last month.

I hate to say it was a lot of hype for nothing, but I do have conflicted feelings about Incarnate, which is why it's taken me two days to actually sit down and write this review... because, not gonna lie, I don't really know what to say and I don't know what to rate it.  It probably would fall at a two and a half for me if I did half stars.

Why, you ask?  Well, let's start out with  the positive - this was a quick read for me and I wasn't bogged down with unnecessary plot or characters.  The plot description really drew me in - a world where souls are continuously reincarnated, Ana was born as a newsoul, she had never existed before and she wants to know why, especially since most of the community seems to discriminate against her.

I did enjoy the little romance Ana had with Sam, especially since in past lives Sam was hesitant to fall in love with anybody.  That made Ana seem a little more special and made me root for her even more.

On the other hand, Incarnate seemed very basic to me.  The plot and characters were basic and so was the reading level.  Those three things left me feeling pretty blah about the whole thing in general.  The plot seemed to happen one event after another and I failed to see motivation from several characters; I wish the characters had been written more in depth.

I'm giving it three stars.  Really, I still don't know about this one.  Incarnate wasn't amazing, but if you're a middle or high school teacher, I think this would be a great book for reluctant readers.